A nimble colossus, Jyoti Basu

Jyoti Basu was a colossus who strode nimbly across the Indian political space. In his heyday, he dominated the opposition political platform, but he was neither imperious nor petulant. For, to him, his success was never personal, it was the product of the correctness of the politics pursued by his party, the Communist Party of India (Marxist).

Mr Basu lived and died by a doctrine that dissected historical forces in order to serve a utopian revolutionary purpose — the creation of a brave new world inhabited by brave new people, free from the oppression and exploitations of a feudal, capitalist, imperialist past. 

History may remember him as the man who was denied the prime ministership by his party, the CPI(M). History may remember him as the man who was repeatedly invited to take charge whenever an impossible coalition of political parties had sufficient numbers in the Lok Sabha to form a government at the Centre. History would, therefore, have to acknowledge that he was an extraordinary person and leader, tolerant and generous, respectful of difference, focused on objectives, fastidious about separating the personal from the public-political.

He was a coalition builder. He had extraordinary foresight and a deep understanding of the political, social, cultural and economic forces that shape the Indian environment and make it unique in its conservative, courageous democratic-autocratic, paternalistic-impersonal complexity.

He, therefore, understood the need for the undivided Communist Party of India to take the parliamentary route to establish itself within the Indian political space.

His genius lay in comprehending the limits of the Indian people’s capacity to cope with radical change and ruptures that alienated the past from the present. Just as he understood the need for the Communist Party to divide in 1964 over the relationship with the Congress and the need to move away from formula Marxism to developing a doctrine that was rooted within the Indian political system. Just as he understood the need for the CPI(M) to support the Congress in 2004 on the basis of a National Common Minimum Programme. Just as he understood the need for the CPI(M) not to withdraw the same support in 2008 over the nuclear deal.

At every point, Mr Basu kept the long-term goal in focus, of nurturing his party to serve the larger cause of the rural and urban poor, the discriminated and exploited, the marginalised and the oppressed. For his goal was not simply winning elections and holding office; his goal was to install the CPI(M) at the very heart of power in India.

It was a puzzle as to why Mr Basu never shifted out of West Bengal. He nurtured his party in the state, led it to spectacular electoral success in 1977, then again in 1982 and then over and over again till 2000, when he formally retired as the chief minister. Even then, he never retired politically, for he believed that a Communist can never quit. As chief minister, his task in 1977 was difficult, yet simple. The CPI(M) had to design a strategy of governance that would set it apart from all other “bourgeois” parties heading governments in other states or even at the Centre.

In 1977, Mr Basu had an untried coalition of the Left. In 2000, it was an experienced and politically-cohesive coalition that has survived the upheavals of the speeded up process of industrialisation under a liberalised economic regime. In 1977, Mr Basu began implementing land reforms, which shifted the power equations in rural Bengal away from the landed peasantry to the new landholders following redistribution of acquired ceiling surplus land. The land was distributed among share croppers and landless, creating a new ownership society. This released the potential power of the peasantry to create wealth from the land. West Bengal’s gross state product grew at the rate of seven percent.

The switch in 1994 to adopting the liberalised economic regime and taking advantage of the opportunities that were opening up after the demise of the licence-permit raj was entirely Mr Basu’s decision.

Unlike land reforms and the panchayati raj institutions in West Bengal that was the outcome of years and years of the CPI(M)’s peasant front movement, the decision to adopt liberalisation and economic reforms was the outcome of Mr Basu’s understanding that “there is a tide in the affairs of men”. This was a
Shakespearean quote that he frequently deployed to explain his radical decision. That the decision was radical could be gauged from the deep suspicion and visceral opposition he faced within his party over it. His adoption of economic reforms preceded its adoption by many Congress state governments and in its own way was a trendsetter.

In other ways too, Mr Basu shaped the Indian political system. By pushing through the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council concept, Mr Basu created the model for autonomous councils for special regions within a single state. This was the model used for creating the Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council and for the Bodo Autonomous Council.

A government that follows a predetermined charter, a common minimum programme that works like a score sheet come election time, was also of Mr Basu’s devising. He adopted it for the Left Front coalition in West Bengal, inserted it into every Third Front government at the Centre and then deployed it in 2004 when the CPI(M) supported the Congress.

Through all his pragmatic manoeuvres Mr Basu remained a passionate believer. His personal style was quintessential Bengali bhadralok; his politics was Marxism. He was never confused, even though others were. He was courteous, aloof, courageous and committed. He was compassionate but never sentimental. He was never a caricature comrade, wearing his heart on his sleeve. If his formidable will had failed to discipline his passion, his idealism and the romance that sustained him would have seared on contact. For he gave his heart, soul and mind to Marxism; he did so from an implacable conviction of its correctness.

(The author is a Kolkata-based political commentator)